[LINK] Email Obfuscation Helps Spammers: Google returns 27 million results for "* at * dot com"

[Jan Whitaker]

At 08:16 AM 18/06/2007, Ivan Trundle wrote:
>If I were to restrict Google.com.au to search .au only:
>Results 1 - 100 of about 28,600 for "at*dot*au". (0.17 seconds) -
>which is stranger itself. Why such a dramatic drop? Surely there
>can't be that many non-.au domains with Australian e-mail addresses?
>Perhaps this is true. And if so, there is a thesis there, I'm sure!

I'm not that surprised. A lot of Australians who participate in 
non-.au groups would have their addresses listed in the faux method - 
yahoo groups, listserves, forums, etc. And those people would have 
fewer number in the whole list/group due to population differences. I 
would expect the ratio to mimic roughly the net participation rates 
of Australians worldwide.

Jan


Jan Whitaker
JLWhitaker Associates, Melbourne Victoria
jwhit at janwhitaker.com
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